Residents launch petition to fix potholes on North Territorial

Tracy Rose has had two flat tires in the past year – a problem she blames on the jagged potholes that litter the stretch of North Territorial Road that travels every day. After hearing the Washtenaw County Road Commission has no immediate plans to fix it, she’s decided to take the matter into her own hands by launching a petition.

According to Rose a two-mile stretch of North Territorial from Webster-Church Road to Donovan Road has become increasingly deteriorated over the last five years.

“For years North Territorial has been a mess with potholes and bumps and coal patch,” she said. “And for the last three-to-five years we’ve expected it to be fixed because it was beyond patching at that point. It came to my attention this year that they have no plans to fix it this year.”

Rose decided to launch a petition and collect signatures to hopefully encourage the Washtenaw County Road Commission to fix the roads. The petition itself is being held at CJ’s Party Store, on the corner of North Territorial and Webster-Church roads.

The idea came from another petition in the area, held at Edith’s Market on the corner of Pontiac Trail and North Territorial roads. The petition received 800 signatures and resulted in their section of North Territorial seeing repairs.

Mike Troczynski, owner of CJ’s Party Store, says he’s seen and heard complaints about North Territorial for years.

“I just thought it would be a good community service thing for me to do and I do travel this route a minimum of twice a day back and forth to my house,” he said. “This particular stretch of road has been a topic of conversation with my customers here for years. People can’t understand why it is that other stretches have been repaired that were in not-awful shape.”

Troczynki says the route is also dangerous as-is.

“This particular stretch – there’s motorcycles that come down this road and there’s bikers that come down this road,” he said. “It truly is dangerous to the point where your car will start traveling off the road slightly when you’re going over this particular stretch especially when the potholes aren’t filled.”

The petition is at CJ’s Party Store and will stay there for about two months, Rose said. She is hoping to match the signatures gained at Edith’s Market – about 800.